AutoBanter - View Single Post - Euro Styling and American Buyers <for Brent P

**Brent P[_1_]** · September 8th 06, 07:47 AM posted to rec.autos.makers.ford.mustang

In article . com>, wrote:

> Go to Ford. The Contour and Mystique were American versions of the
> European Mondeo. They failed.

Because they tried to sell them as tempos. Or are we supposed to believe
americans so stupid as to actually consider the successful tempo the
better car?

> There is the Ford Focus, a
> European-designed small car that started moderately well in the U.S.
> but is seriously slumping.

It started badly due to quality issues in the mexican assembly plant and
likely some cost cutting on the US version. It's slumping because it's
been on the market for some time and has not been changed or updated.
Ford in Europe has replaced the vehicle.

> Go to GM. Remember the Cadillac Catera, an Opel with Cadillac badges,
> imported here? A flop. How about the Saturn LS, a European platform
> with a plastic skin, a flop and now gone like Cateras and
> Contour/Mystique. The Saturn Ion was another of those Euro platforms
> used here. The most successful of the Global/European platform cars
> sold here is the Chevy Malibu, the fleet special, which even GM
> executives say is a design bore.

I don't know GM as well but they have done things in a similiar
craptastic fashion.

> But this doesn't stop executives from thinking the answer to their
> problems, particularly at GM, is at the global approach. Whenever you
> bring up the failures, they just brush them aside or say they weren't
> done well enough.

That's true, they haven't done them well. It's appears that it's
sabotaged from within much of the time. Somebody along the way refuses
to get behind the project.

> The idea that Americans really don't care for the
> European approach is beyond their radar.

If you ignore successful vehicles from overseas. I doubt any ford guy
is going to turn down a Pantera. Nor would I expect any to take a taurus
over an aussie falcon.

> Here are just a few of my complaints with this mindset. There's no
> global exchange here. What GM and Ford want to build are European cars
> with Euro platforms and European engineering. They just want American
> badges on them.

They decontent the cars, sell them poorly, don't understand the market
and just leave the models to die. If they pushed them half as hard as
some of the crap they do sell, they would sell too. GM manages to sell
FWD hunks-o-crap by slaping classic name badges on them which leads me
to believe they just leave cars like the holden with a GTO badge on it
out to die in the field.

> The design freedom for the American versions is quite
> limited because they can only work off the Euro platforms.

They seem to be able to do quite a bit with US platforms... There is no
reason a ford of europe platform would be any more limiting than a ford
US platform.

> If this continues, it won't be long before Americans at GM and Ford
> won't be able to design and engineer a car. They'll just do pickups.
> Look at General Motors: GM forgot how to do a rear-drive car and had to
> borrow from GM Australia. No American car platforms get transferred for
> European production. It's a one-way street.

Wrong. Falcon and fairlane went to the austrailia. Mustang went to
europe. Jeep goes to europe. Just a few I know right off the top of my
head.

> true. GM adapted its minivan designs so that the American-built models
> could be shipped to Europe. But the Europeans at GM never really wanted
> them and the exports stopped. GM made a big fuss about the European
> potential of its Cadillac Seville a few years back, but the GM
> Europeans never really wanted to sell them. It has occurred to me that
> the GM people in Europe want to design and build their own vehicles,
> not sell U.S.-made cars.

Because a lot of what is foisted upon the US market is crap. Americans
aren't buying the vehicles either! The author doesn't seem to notice
that.

> But I still say this is a huge market. There's no reason that we
> shouldn't be able to design and build cars for our market profitably,
> building what our people like, instead of taking a second-best
> compromise - meaning, the best car we could make out of a car really
> designed for the European tastes.

It seems everything that goes through the US executive and marketing
process gets crapified. The longer it spends in the process in the US,
the crappier the car much of the time. Just cheapness and gagetry rather
than vehicle performance and function.

> Ironically, the one company that seems to think there is something
> positive in American design is Chrysler, which has German ownership.
> The Chrysler 300, the Dodge Magnum and Charger don't borrow styling
> from Europe. The smaller models, the PT Cruiser and the new Dodge
> Caliber, are distinctive, too.

Once again the author backs overhimself, as chrysler is sharing
platforms and is importing a number of vehicles (like some vans)
unchanged. The difference is chrysler is apparently doing it
successfully, but doing what he claims is difficult on the order of
impossible when ford and gm are talked about.

> I recall the then-chairman of Ford, standing with me as we looked at
> the new Contour. He said. "If this doesn't work we'll never try it
> again." It didn't work but they haven't stopped trying to shove Euro
> designs down our throats.

Anyone who believes that the tempo was a better car is on crack. Sorry.
The only way ford could have done better IMO was to build a proper RWD
compact again. But the problem is, going through the US system a car
turns out like the tempo.

It's hard to explain how this works, but in product development I've
found that overseas they are allowed much more freedom and forced to
turn out crap. When I worked at a large US corporation the product from
overseas was often better in many ways often had things we wanted to do.
However internal processes and politics made those products impossible
to do in the US. I doubt it's any different at ford or GM.

The reason for turning to the overseas product isn't that a good car
cant be designed here, but that it would take a very long time to
dismantle the entire culture and create the vehicles that time doesn't
exist. Will ford be able to exist for another 7 years or so the way it's
going?